With Thanksgiving over and Christmas rapidly approaching many people have already taken down the Fall decorations and climbed into the attic to break out the Christmas decorations. Often the tendency is to over commercialize Christmas and spend more than your budget can stand. Here are some tips to help you keep Christmas safe and affordable.
Homemade Christmas Gifts
One way to reduce costs and fight the over commercialization of Christmas is with homemade presents. When you first think of “homemade” you might think of a gluey mess of construction paper that you made back in Kindergarten and wonder if anyone would really be happy getting that as a gift.
But as you’ve gotten older hopefully your craft skills have improved a bit and you can create a project that will not only be inexpensive but also appreciated (perhaps even more than a store bought gift) because you put your time, effort and love into it.
If you like to bake you can make cookies for your favorite “cookie monster” or if you prefer knitting or crocheting perhaps you’d like to make potholders or even a “lap rug” or placemats. If woodworking is more your thing, you could make things like paper towel holders, napkin holders or book-ends. See: 40 Homemade Gifts for more ideas.
Christmas Decorations
Although some people prefer a “live” tree and spend $50 or even $100 on a Christmas tree every year. Often Christmas decorations are used over and over, year after year, so the expense is not recurring. Years ago, artificial Christmas trees cost five or even ten times as much as a “live” tree. So it would take many years to break even. But these days companies like LTDCommodities.com offer “pre-lit” Christmas trees for as little as $55.95. And since they are reusable year after year, you could easily save the cost of next year’s tree.
One key to being able to reuse your decorations is to store them properly. If they are tangled, dusty, beat up or broken you will be less inclined (or unable) to use them next year so things like Ornament and giftwrap Storage Boxes can easily pay for themselves.
Save Christmas Cards and Wrappings
It always seems like such a shame to throw away those beautiful Christmas cards you receive. If you save your Christmas cards from previous years, you can use them in a variety of ways. By cutting out sections of the pictures you can use them as “name tags” for your gifts simply by writing “To” and “From” on the back and taping it to the gift. If you want to be a little fancier you can trim the edges with fancy wavy scissors and punch a hole in the corner for a ribbon. Here are 18 more ways to recycle Christmas Cards.
Wrapping paper can also be reused if you use a minimum of tape, when you wrap them and use a bit of caution when unwrapping. Paper used to wrap a large gift could easily be reused for a smaller gift the following year. Also gift bags can easily be reused if you fold them up and store them properly.
Warning: Be Careful with Lights
In the old days Christmas decorations involved lots of energy hungry incandescent light bulbs, of course that was a major improvement over dangerous candles, but today we have even better options as more companies are making LED Christmas lights that use very little energy at all.  So as you are decorating you might want to consider what effect your decorations will have on your electric bill. Are they energy efficient? Are they frayed or a fire hazard? Are cords run neatly around the edges of rooms or are they a tripping hazard?
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- Give the Gift of Wealth
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| An Irish Country Christmas | A Southern Time Christmas | Pennsylvania Dutch Night Before Christmas | Christmas in My Heart, A Third Treasury: Further Tales of Holiday Joy |
Image courtesy of jannoon028 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net.